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Accel Partners CERTIFIED

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FIRM OVERVIEW: Medium Private VC founded in 1983 based out of Palo Alto, United States (US West)

FIRM DESCRIPTION: Accel was established in 1983 with offices in Palo Alto, California and London, as well as in China via the IDG-Accel Partnership. With over $3 billion under management, Accel has helped technology entrepreneurs build over 300 successful companies, many of which have become category-defining companies, including recent IPOs such as MetroPCS (PCS), Infinera (INFN), Comscore (SCOR), and Riverbed (RVBD).

Posted by
sdesh
on 2009-10-21

PUBLIC:

Have had a terrific set of meetings with Rich Wong at Accel. He was engaged, thoughtful, and very straightforward. Moreover, after a substantive meeting, Rich leveraged his rolodex to get us key meetings with industry players that we needed to reach.

What really separates Rich is his ability to not only clearly assess the situation, but more importantly to brainstorm intriguing possibilities together on-the-fly. Many VCs are great at first part (situational assessment), but not so much so on brainstorming together.

Part of the reason is because of Rich’s unique background. Of course, he is Accel’s mobile guru, and has incredible depth there with his executive experience at Openwave and investments in AdMob and GetJar. But beyond that, he brings substantive marketing depth from his P&G days (having run a product line), as well as running Covad’s marketing operations. It enables him to provide depth in numerous areas beyond traditionally known areas. For example, with our company Tapioca Mobile, we were able to meaningfully discuss with Rich how we can enter the “below-the-line” promotional marketing space (which is a total separate space from the well-known “above-the-line” digital advertising).

If you a meeting with Rich, I believe there are two keys for a successful meeting:
1. Be Prepared – In addition to having your standard VC pitch, have 2-3 ideas teed up to brainstorm. Rich is incredibly sharp and will be able to dive right into the discussion.
2. Help Rich Be Prepared – Rich prefers materials sent to him in advance, so he can go thru them beforehand. It will help him assess the situation sooner, so he can better brainstorm together with you.

Posted by
mobileceo
on 2007-03-19

On the positive: showed up on time, listened to the pitch, paid attention without Blackberry-distractions. That honestly does count for something

On the negative:
- Began the meeting with a long description of 'why I'm a VC and about me'. Ironically, he had only been VC for a year or so
- Was tremendously patronizing
- Name-dropped and corrected subjective assessments as if they were idiotic
- Kept on saying 'if there's absolutely anything I can do to help,' but then mentioned small innocuous requests, which immediately blew off

Simon was very engaged, agreeing to meet on a number of occasions. He is very attentive, listens carefully and lets you finish, before bringing up his concerns and views. Very open and honest, overall, a very nice experience, would definitely pitch again.

Posted by
Eastcoast
on 2007-05-04

PUBLIC:

Aggressive guy. Will get a deal closed quickly. But be careful - can be childish.
He's pretty inexperienced so take what he says with a grain of salt. Get ready for a lot of examples from facebook etc.

Posted by
Vagabond
on 2011-05-09

PUBLIC:

We Pitched to Adam and Accell late in the process of C round.

They responded immediately, flew over the weekend and started the deepest Due diligence we ever went through. They met the team, the board and related companies. Very significant amount of work was done in a very short time.
In the process and as part of the DD they introduced us to several leads that later turned into customers.
they made sure to do the reference calls and other checks done before signing the TS so it will not risk the company and made us give up other offers. (it was critical)

The deal fell through on terms a minute before signing the TS. I was truly disappointed.

After getting funded by multiple VCs, It was one of those cases that it feels that the VC can make a significant positive difference in the probability of success.

Posted by
Kaiser Sose
on 2008-10-31

PUBLIC:

I gagged with how many times the partners referred to Facebook and how Accel is responsible for their success. I have serious respect for the old guard at Accel, their reputation cannot be ignored. But the rookies here leave a lot to be desired. They offered little in the way of strategic insight, operational expertise but took a lot of credit for their entrepreneurs accomplishments and professed a lot of knowledge they didnt actually have.

Due diligence revealed that the Facebook people view Accel as purely a source of money, and take pride in the fact that Accel has no power in the company. Apparently they kept control of the company via the Founders Fund. More than one reference has said that Accel LOVES to replace entrepreneurs with their own CEOs to assume control of their portfolio.

Overall, they were good and spent a fair amount of time. But they couldnt transcend the prevailing shallow "IT" and application orientation of enterprise software to a business context or purpose oriented one.
"What space are you in...""There isn't one. This is an emerging area - something that allows storage, organization, communications, and access through search in a unified way. For emails - data, and documents! It is the future!.
"No - it cant be; you've got to decide are you in emails" or Document management" or data management"" But we are all of that and process automation...
"No, that is a different space ...."
Anyway, thats how the conversation went for about 4 or 5 sessions and then we got the no-phone call no-email brush off. I wonder how new ideas can florish if they must fit into a specific shoe box in a pigeon holed cupboard.

Posted by
RalfM
on 2007-09-18

PUBLIC:

We pitched with one of my German clients (Web 2.0 business) to Accel Partners in London.
While Heikki Makijarvi (Venture Development at Accel London) has a difficult to pronounce Finn name (you better practice before you meet him ;-) is he a very smart and nice guy. Heikki has quickly setup a productive meeting with Kevin Comolli (Managing General Partner at Accel) a very experienced VC. Heikki and Kevin assessed the opportunity and drilled deeper into the subject. Even while they finally decided to not invest, gave they us some hints of how to better bring our message across and informed us honestly about their decision logic.

I have met Accell on both sides of the pond and there is a clear divide -- with the UK on the losing end (soft ethics).

As an example, Accel still publisizes the hiring of the X-CEO of Sonera (incumbant operator from Finland). He left in a wave of shame - I beleive he even served jail time for his activities at Sonera. Bad corporate culture spreads -- I know them to back a company in Europe that is far from scrupulous and I oft wonder how far they go for deals. I would be leary of the UK branch.

US has some really good people - some of the best I've met in the industry.

Late on a friday afternoon, pitched to an associate with a razor sharp intellect. Often we have to clarify some aspects, since we're operating in a unexplored space. This guy got it immediately and even called his wife to postpone dinner plans to continue speaking with us well into the evening. Communications continue as we develop. He continues to support or efforts as we progress from R&D into tech beta.

Posted by
tssllc
on 2009-06-21

PUBLIC:

Accel's Miles Clements took the time out from a hectic day to chat to us about our new venture. It was not in the Accel investment space but he was able to give his opinion on what may improve our business plan. This guy is sharp and if you get the opportunity to meet Miles you will get great value & insights for funding.

Posted by
Dashford
on 2008-05-20

PUBLIC:

Before we were even ready to raise any funding we approached Accel in London and specifically identified Avid Larizadeh because of her experience at eBay.

We asked for a conference call with her to validate our plans, ie "we're not ready to ask for funding yet but we want to start a dialogue with you early to ensure we are going about things the right way".

She replied promptly and we ended up holding an hour long conference call where we went through our plans. She provided some great feedback, especially about our choice of technology, the type of metrics that are important and our financials. In general, I think she liked our concept but stressed that it is all about the metrics and not really about whether anyone likes our concept!

We took on board her feedback and made some changes.

We've kept Avid updated on our progress and plan to approach Accel for series-A funding in 3 to 6 months.

Posted by
Jyri EngestrÃ¶m
on 2008-05-14

I just had to post this. When we raised our first round, Accel took a look and I got some great focused feedback from Kevin Efrusy. We contacted him when looking at our next round, and he eagerly introduced us to Commoli. Commoli's assistant told us six weeks out is the first time he could meet. I guess times are good over there. ;-)

We had a very good conversation with them - thoughful and observant. But then they vanished - simply never responded to calls or emails. I've presented to many firms, both large and small- and found that at the very least you get a pass. But radio silence is a first. Not sure what to make of it. Tried to contact them a few times - but never did get a call back. Weird.